• The slow economy in North Texas has finally kicked DART right in the teeth, our Michael Lindenberger reports. Its top executives said yesterday that sharply reduced bus and rail services are almost certain, and plans to build a second downtown Dallas rail line and to complete the Orange Line to the airport are now in jeopardy.

• And DART board members said yesterday that if Super Bowl organizers want the agency to ferry patrons to the stadium in Arlington on the big day, all they need to do is show them the money, Lindenberger reports.

• It turns out the Feb. 11 storm that buried Dallas under a record 12.5 inches of snowfall left a lot more debris than anyone figured. But city officials say crews will still finish collecting the downed tree limbs by April 10. Read our Michael Young’s report here.

• The Dallas-Fort Worth area added more new residents last year than any other metropolitan area in the country, according to U.S. Census Bureau data released yesterday. Our Eric Aasen has a story on that.

Michael writes: The briefing by the city makes clear that the $29 million the city will spend to study the levees will only be the start of its expenses. In addition, the city will spend some $8 million in FY2010, which begins Oct. 1. Some of that is one-time costs, but about $4.5 million will be required every year in additional maintenance and operations.

Dallas Morning News transportation Michael Lindenberger, Rudy Bush and I attended a press conference this morning during which Mayor Tom Leppert, amid a flurry of other news about the Trinity River Corridor’s troubled levees, urged residents to purchase flood insurance.

Leppert says his suggestion shouldn’t be cause for fear among people living near the levees, but rather, a prudent step for them while flood insurance rates are relatively low.

Testing the Trinity River levees will cost at least $29 million and delay the Trinity River toll road by at least 20 months, Mayor Tom Leppert will tell the Dallas City Council today.

On March 31, the aging earthen dikes that protect downtown Dallas flunked an inspection by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, whose engineers said they no longer could be sure the levees would withstand a flood equal to the 1990 Trinity River flood. To find out for sure, the city would need to conduct extensive evaluations.

That extensive testing will cost at least $29 million and take until spring 2012.

Your daily dose of news and views from in and around Dallas City Hall:

• The Dallas City Council conducts a weekly briefing meeting today, during which it’s slated to officially place on the May 9 ballot to propositions that separately seek to prohibit the city from owning a convention center hotel and require a public vote each time the city wants to grant many private developers subsidies exceeding $1 million. Also on tap: a briefing on improved tree planting in Dallas, and an authorization of a one-year contract to purchase $7.8 million worth of unleaded and diesel fuel for the city’s vehicle fleet.

• The discovery of sand in the soil near the Trinity River Corridor’s levees could seriously complicate efforts to bring the levees up to federal standards after they received a failing grade from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, reports our own Michael Lindenberger and Rudy Bush. It’s yet another possible setback in Dallas’ effort to push forward with creating a full compliment of amenities — a park, a toll road, bridges and improved flood control — as part of the more than decade-old Trinity River Corridor project.

• Former Dallas Mayor Ron Kirk’s bid to become the next U.S. trade representative doesn’t appear to be on ice, despite some lingering tax issues, the DMN‘s Dave Michaels writes.

Yeah, I’ve been getting that a lot lately. From newspaper colleagues. From relatives. From Dallas City Council members. (Except Jerry Allen, who says he thinks it’s cool.)

Anyhow, I kinda have a thing for the high arctic. OK, a really big, weird thing. Each year, I travel there, where it’s predictably cold, delightfully empty and the sun shines at 2 a.m. I hike and climb, kayak and canoe, write and read, and snap enough photographs that, if shot on film, would single-handedly keep Eastman Kodak in business for a short eternity. It’s heaven, frozen.